Just your average girl undertaking to shop for myself only at VV Boutique or other second-hand sources for an ongoing style adventure!
VV Boutique, by the way, is Value Village!

Friday, 12 October 2012

Leopard Learning

This wild thing has been sitting in my closet for a while...

Dillard's blouse $6 VV Boutique

This photo is from Oct 10 and YES that is a good covering of snow on the trees.

Even though I love the blouse, purchased on Fashion's Night Out at the advice of my fashionable friends, I have been having a hard time styling it. The shiny fabric felt too dressy for work most days, too expected to pair with plain old dress pants (in fact, I felt compelled to call them "slacks" when I tried them on together...). It is not a contemporary cut, probably been around for a while - which is not necessarily a bad thing, since it demonstrates the good quality of the piece and that animal print is a timeless neutral. I finally tried them with my skinny cargos and was satisfied (though not wowed):

Initially I put a black cardi and scarf with the ensemble, but fresh from some schoolin' from my stylish friends, I thought better and added colour! Purple is the colour of royalty, so I thought it a good aesthetic fit with the leopard print and sheen of the blouse.

I like the square scarf shape and the light pink/purple ties in nicely!

Some pretty accessories finished it off, including an inexpensive bracelet from my closet and

these gorgeous earrings ($14 from Plaid Giraffe) from my turn in Splurge Sorority!

I was comfortable all day at work throughout the chilly snowy fall day! But looking back on the photos, the pants are a bit ... "happy". You know, that look when they "smile" at you from the crotchular area? It was the end of the day, so they may have stretched out a bit, but that was the case too the last time I wore them and I didn't notice the happy. This morning it dawned on me - the last time I wore them was about half way into Whole 30 and I think I'm just a smidge slimmer now. I am sharing this to make an important point: skinnier isn't always better when it comes to clothes! Fit is what counts! These pants look better with a bit more booty to fill them! Luckily, we have a high-cake weekend approaching so I'm sure that will be taken care of, and if not, I may just throw them in the dryer for a bit, and/or style them differently - maybe even with this leopard-print blouse in a different way! I'm learning about style... slowly but surely...and the process is a lot easier with VV Boutique there to provide these inexpensive pieces!